Small Things in Time

I work in core networks, and I am a rider of a sinking ship. Simply put, with advancing capabilities of the access network equipment, core network will very soon become obsolete.

Decentralization is a keyword in telecom trend. Core network, even by its name defies this trend. We now have BSCs which support local switching. We have femto cells, with heterogeneous handovers.

In heterogeneous handovers with IP networks, a voice call from a GSM/UMTS/WCDMA network seamlessly shifts to an IP network provider which is connected to the GSM/UMTS/WCDMA core network. Just think of the case when the second party mobile station is also hooked up to an IP network. If our network is intelligent enough to recognize that, the call can be routed from one IP provider to the other IP provider, totally bypassing the conventional core network. Does that remind you of Skype? It does, only that you loose the ability to roam wherever you want.

This is where metropolitan wireless technologies come in. Current WiMAX services feature their exclusive voice services. In future, they will be nothing more than a wireless ISP. Users will be free to choose a voice provider of their liking. This trend is exactly why GSM operators shouldn’t wait for LTE. Its time to take action and plan transition to a true IP network.

Currently, telecom networks provide the end user network connectivity as well as the voice/data services. We are moving to a world where there would be an IP network provider & a voice provider, two would be totally differentiable entities. Operators can either choose to confine themselves to a big hall full of routers, or they can go out and provide mobility services to the users. Voice providers wouldn’t have to worry about mobility anymore. With protocols like SIP, you don’t need to worry about mobility, all you need is an IP address.

Vendors today have started producing MSC servers, media gateways which support variety of VoIP protocols and transmission layers, including SIP and RTP. VoIP is a whole different ball game than SS7/SIGTRAN. Current operators who own these nodes can easily convert their MSCs to voice servers. But will they be able to hold their ground? Open source VoIP solutions such as Asterisk IP PBX have revolutionized the concept of internet telephony. With IAX, an Asterisk voice server is expandable without any theoretical limit. With such strong competition, with a voice operator working in every next street, how can even the largest of operators keep standing? All one would need to start hosting voice services would be a big internet trunk, and an Asterisk box connected to a regulatory defining the number levels and routing decisions. And like the way internet works, one day all the hundred of thousands of Asterisk boxes will form a giant mesh, with extremely smart routing strategies. Knock knock big operators?

Lets take the dream to another level. This is what even the internet hasn’t achieved yet. I dream of the day when even the voice providers would fade away. Every thing would be absolutely peer-to-peer. All the serving wireless towers would be connected to each other in a mesh. Remember decentralization being the keyword? All routing decisions for the far end user would take place at your serving site/router. Who needs a voice provider when you have peer to peer?

I believe I am talking about the telecom world as it would be no more than 10 years from now. One day, not very far away, I will sit down and tell my children of how once there used to be a core network, that we so fondly worked for.

Though I work in a mobile service provider, I can’t really say that I was a big fan of cell phones until a few days ago when Gmail Mobile was released by Google. I have been using it since day 1 and I’m stuck to it! Its absolutely revolutionary! Let me give you an idea.

Okay so what? We always had an e-mail service of some kind or other on our mobile phones. Why is Gmail Mobile special? First, you don’t need to sign up for anything new. Second, this service is not associated withyour service provider either.

Alright, these two things can be achieved otherwise too if you have a cell phone with HTML browser with a GPRS service which supports HTML browsers. Thats where Gmail Moble is different. It comes in a little Java App which reduces time required to load all the HTML and makes it so much faster!

Sync’d Mail: There are some services which also come in Java App and are actually pretty good. But that doesn’t change the fact that you will have to sign up for a new mail account and inform everyone about your new mail address.

Customized for your handset: Gmail Mobile that you will use is specially made for your handset and keeps the limitations of your set catered.

The interface is amazing and so comfortable, best mobile mail interface I’ve seen so far! Here are a few pictures of Gmail as it looks on my Motorola L6.

Yes I know that picture quality suck so don’t whine about it. This is what happens when you use another cell to snap your cell screen.

Motorola L6 is a rather sucky handset when it comes to screen size, resolution and colors but Gmail uses its limited capabilities to the max and runs pretty fine. You shouldn’t expect Gmail for L6 to be as sleek as Gmail for Blackberry. And shutup! I still love L6 Costed me Rs. 200 (~$3) so who cares if it doesn’t have SMS delivery reports

And I will close this post by telling you all about a little tip to all you mobile surfers out there. If you don’t have an HTML browser in your cell phone and you want to view an HTML page, all you have to do is point your WAP browser to mobile.google.com/gwt/n?u=<url> (e.g. mobile.google.com/gwt/n?u=stinger.wordpress.com) and Google will convert the page to WAP compatible format and display it to you.

Have a nice day staring at your cell!